Can We Match Tsunami Effort?
First Planning Session Held to
Assist Hurricane Katrina’s Victims
By Alex Holachek (September 9, 2005)
The efforts of the students and faculty to provide aid to the victims of
Hurricane Katrina were jump-started Wednesday at a quick but productive after-school
meeting. The gathering attracted about 50 students and several faculty members,
many of whom suggested diverse ways of assisting the evacuees.
Principal Bob Snee
began the meeting with a reminder of last year’s wildly successful tsunami
relief efforts, which overshot the initial conservative goal of $10,000 by
almost four times. He then led a brainstorming session that focused on creating
maximum relief impact.
Thereafter, the group discarded ideas that seemed too specific (as no one
yet knew exactly what the aid agencies needed) or not profitable enough (rubber
bracelets were deemed too expensive to manufacture).
Many viable proposals emerged from this brainstorming process, ranging from
a Battle of the Bands performance to a program of individual student fundraising.
The students, several of whom had suggested that extra credit in classes be
offered as incentive for participation in fundraising, realized that their
ideas would not be officially condoned.
|
|
Some of the 50 students
and faculty who attended the
first planning meeting for relief for hurricane Katrina
victims. (Photo by Morgan Moscati)
|
By the close of the meeting, a steering committee consisting of especially
committed students had been formed, and others who attended the meeting had
written their names on a directory of interested students. The group dispersed
with a resolve to involve other interested students by means of publicity,
and with the general sentiment that, with planning, hard work, and widespread
participation, the relief efforts this year could possibly outdo even last
year’s tsunami aid program.
Tell us what you
think. E-mail lassogmhs@hotmail.com
|
